Mandalay questions
 

I leave for Myanmar in 2 weeks with a group of four friends. We have our itinerary pretty well worked out, but Mandalay is presenting challenges. I understand that the main appeal here is the ancient cities outside the center, and so I'd like to have a game plan rather than improvise our days.

None of us are interested in sitting in a car from morning to evening driving from site to site - so those "three ancient cities in a day" itineraries have zero appeal.

Here's our current game plan:

Day 1. Arrive 1 pm from Bangkok. Hopefully we are over our jet lag. Check into hotel, then taxi to Shwenanddaw Kyaung Pagoda area - about 20" ride from hotel. Sunset in Mandalay Hill area.

Day 2. Morning boat to Mingun. From there catch a ride to Sagaing, spend afternoon there.

Day 3. "A Glimpse of Mandalay" eco-tour. Has anyone done this? It looks excellent, but I don't always trust TripAdvisor reviews. It's a full day, so I want to make sure it's legit before we commit.

Day 4-14. Onwards to Bagan, Kalaw, Inle, and Yangon.


I read that Sagaing is one of the highlights of the Mandalay region, and that the best thing to do is to walk the paths and explore the pagodas. Every book and website says this. Sounds great! But then the same review will always recommend hiring a private driver for the day to drive you to the pagodas - which is the exact opposite of walking and exploring on your own.

If we just take a taxi to Sagaing, where would we start? I saw a recommendation from a few years ago to start at "Chin Thay Da Kaung / One Lion Gate" - but I can't figure out where this is, and there's no references to this in any of the books I have.

Follow up question: Is it easy to find taxis back to Mandalay, especially in the late afternoon early evening?

And finally: I see mixed reviews about U-Bein Bridge - and lots of photos of large bus loads of tourists crowding the entry. It doesn't quite match the iconic photos we all see of monks silhouetted against the setting sun. Should we really push to be there at sunset (5:22 pm), or is this site misable relative to the other sites?

And one more smaller question: we have arranged for a van and driver to get from Bagan to Kalaw. Are there any places, besides Mt. Popa, that people would recommend stopping at along the route? In particular, where should we lunch? (any cuisine)

I'd love to know what the rest of your itinerary looks like, as you are spending a lot of time in the Mandalay area - an area few people love. Sagaing is lovely - I'd ask to be dropped off at the top of the hill, and spend the day walking down, visiting the various pagodas and monasteries on the way. A driver is not a guide, so you can employ a driver and wander on your own, which is what we did. Then we'd meet up with the driver again and have him take us to the next place we wanted to see. I used a driver, so really can't tell you about the availability of taxis. But if you are concerned, you can make an arrangement with the driver you use to get to Sagaing. Sorry, I don't know "Chin Thay Da Kaung / One Lion Gate" I've been there twice, the last time in 2015.

I've never heard of "A Glimpse of Mandalay" eco-tour." But if you wanted just a glimpse of Mandalay, it should;t take more than a couple of hours max. In the city itself there is little to see. The "Palace" area is a complete reconstruction and bears no relationship to the original which was completely destroyed. If you are interested in getting away from other visitors, we employed a driver/guide last year to take us to less visited places in the Mandalay area. Indeed, we saw no other visitors that day.

The U-Bien Bridge is an iconic image of this part of Myanmar. If you are a photographer, you will want to see it and photograph it. There were no busloads of tourists when we were there, but we were there in 2011.

Mt Papa gets very mixed reviews. Many people object to climbing the mountain barefoot through the monkey poop.

Your driver will know places to take you for lunch on the way.

I have three trip reports here, from 2009, 2011 and 2015. Photos are at www.marlandc.com

What great photos! It's ironic that some of the best photos, to me, were from the Ava, the site you liked the least.

And I can't realistically skip U-Bein. My friends leave all the planning to me, but they'd probably rebel if I skipped an iconic site.

The Glimpse of Mandalay tour actually spends most of the time outside the city. Apart from the tripadvisor reviews, this blogger writes about the day:

http://www.kariaroundtheworld.com/as...e-of-mandalay/

I'm now 95% certain that we'll do this, if there's room.

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Our itinerary looks like this:

3 nights in Bangkok. Recover from jet lag.

Day 1: Arrive Mandalay, 1 pm. Option A: Explore sites around Mandalay Hill. Option B: Head to Amarapura / U-Bein Bridge.

Day 2: A Glimpse of Mandalay.

Day 3: Either Mingun + Sagaing, or Sagaing + Amarapura.

Day 4: Ferry to Bagan.

Day 5, 6: Bagan.

Day 7: Van to Kalaw.

Day 8: Green Hill Valley Elephant Camp.

Day 9: Taxi to Inle, or train to Heho + taxi. The train sounds like an adventure, but it's also market day in Kalaw, so the guys might want to linger. We'll decide the night before.

Day 10, 11: Lake Inle

Day 12: Morning flight to Yangon

Day 13, 14: Yangon

Day 15: Morning flight to Kuala Lumpur.

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Also, it's nice to see someone else who reads up before a trip! My bookshelf isn't as comprehensive as yours:

From the Land of Green Ghosts, Pascal Khoo Thwe. Fantastic, I would recommend this to everyone.

Burmese Days, George Orwell. I didn't finish. It's a well written novel about awful people. I might get back to it.

The River of Lost Footsteps, Thant Myint-U. I'm almost finished. Really good for putting the recent history of Burma in context.

Letters from Burma, Aung San Suu Kyi. On my shelf.

Chroniques Birmane, Guy DeLisle. On my shelf.

The Glass Palace, Amitav Ghosh. I'll bring this with me. Airplane, boat, and train reading.

Burmese by Ear, John Okell. I've been doing these lessons on my morning commute, supplementing them with exercises on Memrise. I think I have a grasp of the basics of the language ... I'll find out soon.

I'm sure you will have a wonderful trip.

Yes, the photos of Ava are lovely, the experience of going there was not. I don't know if things have changed, if you can hire a horsecart to take you to other stops or if it is still so regimented.

Enjoy your trip!

Thanks, I'm really looking forward to this trip.

I keep reading how much people liked Sagaing, and would have liked to have more time there. I think we'll end up doing the easy thing, hire a driver, and just make that a focus of one day. I'll give a pass on trying to work Mingun in. I like to be active, but I also like lazy mornings and don't want to be rushing to meet a boat bus or train every single morning.

And for anyone who is interested, A Glimpse just sent me the agenda for their tour:

9:00- 9:30 AM – pick up at your hotel.

10:00- 10:30 AM – A brief tour to the local market to collect ingredients and observe the daily life of Mandalarians.

10:30- 11:00 AM – enjoy the famous Myanmar tea culture in a local tea shop and chat with the local people.

11:00- 12:30 PM – hand on teaching of Burmese cuisines.

12:30- 1:45 PM – enjoy the lunch and relax in a traditional hut.

2:00- 3:30 PM – a brief bicycle tour to observe a Burmese village and country sides.

4:00 PM – go to the historic Yan Kin Hill (unexplored by tourists) for sunset.

6:00 – 6:30 PM- drop you off at your hotel/restaurants.

When you come back and tell us all about your trip, do tell us what you thought of the "A Glimpse" tour.

"Day 9: Taxi to Inle, or train to Heho + taxi. The train sounds like an adventure,..."

An "adventure" is one way of putting it. I'll say that I've had a number of off-the-path, basic experiences in Asia but, unless the train situation has vastly improved which I doubt, do take a taxi to Inle. The train was a nightmare, filthy plus extreme physical discomfort. This is my report:

http://www.travelgumbo.com/blog/the-...n-in-the-world

I'm working on a full trip report, but in the meantime: A Glimpse of Mandalay was a fun and interesting day; 2 1/2 days in Mandalay was fine; we ended up doing the horse carts in Inwa and it sucked as predicted, though overall the standard three-cities tour was good; and we all enjoyed the train from Kalaw to Shwe Nyaung (Inle) and would easily recommend it.

Details coming soon!

I look forward to your report!